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Govt sets 12% teleworking target

The federal government wants 12 per cent of public servants to work from home one day a week by 2020.

Communications Minister Stephen Conroy says the government wants to increase the number of staff from the Australian Public Service using the internet to work from home, known as teleworking, from six per cent to 12 per cent within eight years.

A paper by consultant Deloitte to be released on Monday suggests teleworking will boost gross domestic product by $3.2 billion a year by 2020/21, which is the equivalent of 25,000 full-time jobs.

Prime Minister Julia Gillard will announce the government's target via a videolink from Parliament House into the Telework Congress at Melbourne University on Monday.

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"What we are finding from the survey and the studies that we have been doing is that more people are prepared to come back into the workforce," Senator Conroy told ABC Radio on Monday.

"More people, who aren't able to participate in the workforce at the moment, would be able to stay in the workforce if they were able to work from home."

Senator Conroy said the 12 per cent target was not overly ambitious as the United States was already at that level.

He said the program should cost little to implement across the public service.

The minister said the national broadband network (NBN) would underpin the reliability and the consistency of internet performance required for the program.

The government is rolling out high-speed broadband optic fibre cable to 93 per cent of homes, schools and businesses across Australia by 2021, with the remaining seven per cent to be provided by fixed wireless and satellite technologies.